Solving Wastewater Management Challenges for Non- Point Source Nitrogen Control in Coastal Watersheds
EPA Water Quality Cooperator Grant CP-97135401-0
Prepared by the Cape Cod Commission Water Resources Program
September 2009
The is the final report of activities undertaken by the Cape Cod Commission relative to a US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) grant entitled, “Solving Wastewater Management Challenges for Non-Point Source Nitrogen Control in Coastal Watersheds.” The goal of this project was to develop technical assistance materials to educate and
assist communities to establish and implement new regulatory, planning, and wastewater management strategies for non-point source nitrogen control.
The period of activity on the EPA grant spanned from August 2005 to September 2009. Cape Cod scientists, planners, and officials made some very significant advances in their understanding of coastal eutrophication and its relation to implementing Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs). At the beginning of this grant, towns were just beginning to
receive the first set of Massachusetts Estuaries Project (MEP) Technical Reports, the Barnstable County Wastewater Implementation Committee was completing work on over $2.7 million dollars of technical assistance to the communities, and the Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative was established to assist the region in securing better financial assistance.
Cape Cod Commission staff established a short-term working group that assisted in discussing the use of MEP findings in Comprehensive Wastewater Management Plans (CWMPs), natural attenuation, nutrient trading, and the scope of a regional “Coastal Waters Restoration Conference” in November 2006. Commission staff also worked with
local groups and Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protect (MassDEP) staff on their watershed planning and pilot Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) implementation grant. A significant task was determining the town and subwatershed allocation of nitrogen load from the MEP Technical Reports. When towns begin to discuss sharing TMDL compliance, they need to know just how much of the daily load is from each town.
Cape Cod Commission staff also incorporated the approved EPA TMDLs into the Cape Cod Regional Policy Plan. The Regional Policy Plan sets the regulatory and planning standards that the Commission uses in its review of Developments of Regional Impact (DRIs), which include local CWMPs. The 2009 revision of the Regional Policy Plan recognizes the approved TMDLs as watershed management goals. Towards this end the Commission has stepped away from the “no net” nitrogen-loading policy and has recognized that a private development is entitled to a “fair share” of the watershed nitrogen load as defined by the TMDL. The fair-share approach offers an equitable allocation of available nitrogen capacity to projects until comprehensive solutions are implemented.
Cape Cod Commission staff have reviewed and commented on CWMPs for the towns of Mashpee, Falmouth, Barnstable, Orleans, and Chatham. Staff also assisted other towns indeveloping scopes of work, providing graphics, and participating in selection committees that are beginning the CWMP process. Staff from the Cape Cod Commission and the University of Massachusetts–Dartmouth School for Marine Science and Technology (SMAST) identified a need to educate local officials and consultants on the procedure to obtain water quality modeling scenarios
from the MEP Technical Team. The Commission and other partners organized a MEP workshop that was held in Hyannis. Staff also worked with the Town of Mashpee to compile a universal land use database for MEP scenarios proposed by the town’s consultants, and reviewed and recommended MEP scenarios of Lewis Bay for the Town
of Barnstable.
Commission staff identified a regional need to provide groundwater modeling technical assistance to the towns and undertook an initiative to build this capacity. Commission staff assisted the MEP in the delineations of watersheds in the Monomoy Lens and undertook investigations of contaminant migration and wellhead protection for the
Sagamore Lens. In a similar manner, Commission staff provided technical reviews of groundwater modeling scopes of work and assessments of preferred treated-wastewatereffluent disposal sites for the towns of Chatham, Orleans, and Falmouth. The Commission also distributed the final US Geological Survey report on groundwater
modeling work that was funded by Barnstable County. The Commission prepared maps, tables, and other compilations of the status of wastewater planning and MEP reports across Cape Cod. These materials were incorporated into the Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative web site and numerous technical presentations on Cape Cod and other regions to transfer this technical knowledge to others.
Extending the period of this grant back to 2001 when a major investment in technical assistance by Barnstable County and Cape Cod towns began, the number of towns that are in the CWMP process has increased from four in 2001 to 13 in 2009. Of those, five are in, or have been in regulatory MEPA review. As we begin to see these efforts come to
conclusion, public support and understanding of the science, technologies, and management of TMDL implementation will be increasingly important. Participants at the Coastal Restoration Conference indicated, in their evaluations, that the odds of successful TMDL implementation was a good bet; however, they cited cost as the overwhelming
constraint, and education as the key to get there.